


Game over (Give up?)

by Yleisnotonfire



Series: Sudden inspiration [9]
Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Insecure Kim Mingyu, It's short but it was supposed to be even shorter, M/M, Mentioned Kim Mingyu, POV Jeon Wonwoo, another fic based on a song, i wrote this at 2am, kind of a happy ending?, mention of depression
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-16
Updated: 2019-04-16
Packaged: 2020-01-14 23:14:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18486424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yleisnotonfire/pseuds/Yleisnotonfire
Summary: "If this was a game I could load it again. I guess I gotta deal with this real world."Wonwoo's hurt and his heart won't heal.He wants to give up but can he?





	Game over (Give up?)

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by a BTS song [**Jamais Vu**](https://youtu.be/G3x17KyNJtg)  
>  you can listen to it while you're reading if you want to!
> 
> Enjoy it ♡

_ “Game over. Give up?”  _

 

Wonwoo reads the words appearing on the screen almost out loud. 

It’s not the first time he’s seen them. He’s a really good gamer and rarely loses (even the hardest levels) but, when he does, the “game over” screen would come on the screen and he’s fast to hit the replay button and play the level again as if nothing happened. However, today, the words hit him really hard sending his brain into an angsty place he had rather preferred to leave behind. 

Maybe it’s because of the storyline of the new game he’s playing or maybe it was something even deeper but he suddenly remembers that, two years ago on that same day, he had broken up with Mingyu. 

 

Those four words, which are continuously blinking on the screen, bring him back to the last fight he had with Mingyu. 

They had shouted and thrown things at each other, the taller being mad at Wonwoo because he thought that, lately, the older was acting weird. He had sensed something changing between them and just assumed that Wonwoo had started meeting someone else, resulting in the older cheating on his boyfriend. 

To Wonwoo, it didn’t make sense. How could he be cheating when he is too deep in love with the younger? And if, IF, Wonwoo had fallen out of love, he still wasn’t the type who would cheat. He’d rather talk to his boyfriend and tell him that, sadly, things turned out that way and he couldn’t do anything about it because, you know, you can’t have full control of your feeling. However, that wasn’t the case with Wonwoo. He’s so whipped for Mingyu but the boy wouldn’t listen. He eventually got angry, thinking that Wonwoo was just trying to cover his mess with nothing but lies. 

 

Lies about why he disappears in the middle of the day.

 

Lies about where he was spending the nights. 

 

Lies about still loving Mingyu like the first day they met. 

 

Wonwoo remembers sighing and sitting on the couch to calm himself down. Getting angry wouldn’t have lead to nothing good but things got bad anyways. He tried explaining his behaviours, tried changing what Mingyu thought were lies into truth. 

 

Wonwoo had joined a project consisting of writing a novel and if he got the first place, his book would’ve been published. Since the deadline was getting closer, he was busy finishing and editing it. Why didn’t he tell Mingyu? It was supposed to be a surprise. He had written about them, about their love story and wanted to show him after the winners would’ve been announced, regardless of the results. 

 

He hadn’t been spending the nights in his dorm because his friend Soonyoung had started dating too and used to bring his date into their dorm, getting loud at night thinking no one would’ve heard them. Wonwoo would leave his room and take a walk around the campus until he was sure that everything was done. Why didn’t he tell Mingyu? Because he knew the younger would have invited him to spend the night in his room and Wonwoo didn’t want to burden him. It wasn’t that big deal for him as he could enjoy the silence of the night and even get some inspiration for his book. 

 

Wonwoo does love Mingyu like the first day they met. Well, maybe he loves him even more than back then. Wonwoo still feels giddy when he’s with him, he still feels the butterfly in his stomach when they touch or when they’re simply standing next to each other, he still feels his heart thumping like crazy whenever the taller looks at him softly or kisses him. Why didn’t he tell Mingyu? Because he thought it was obvious how crazy he is for him, how he’s left breathless but his very existence. 

 

However, Mingyu, despite looking confident and fearless, had a lot of fears and insecurities. He felt like he didn’t deserve to be loved, to be adored. He was afraid that people would eventually grow tired of him and abandon him. Mingyu is not made for being lonely and he doesn’t want to be left alone. With Wonwoo, things were getting better for a while. Mingyu was slowly getting rid of these fears, he was learning that he’s a precious being who is worth being loved. But lately, there was a sudden regression that lead him to that moment where, in a fit of rage, he shouted: 

 

_ “I can’t take this anymore! It’s torture living with the constant fear of being left behind, of being dumped! All I can think about is how I am probably making a fool out of myself in front of people, talking about how much I love you while probably you’re having fun with someone else! Maybe, you’re even doing it right in front of my eyes but I’m too dumb to notice it!”  _

 

Wonwoo was left speechless. He stood there, mind blank as he didn’t know what else he could do to make him change his mind, to make him understand that the things he was saying weren’t true. He wasn’t interested in anybody else because he could only see the tall puppy-like guy standing in front of him right at that very moment. Mingyu really was the only one for him since the moment he had laid his eyes on him the first time they met.

He didn’t know what to say so he remained silent. Of course, Mingyu took it as Wonwoo admitting his faults. 

 

Mingyu broke up with him and Wonwoo didn’t say anything, thinking it was the best thing for the other boy. 

Wonwoo wouldn’t want his lover to be trapped in a spiral of dark thoughts, of insecurities because of his selfish desire of keeping Mingyu next to him. 

The bright Mingyu doesn’t deserve that. 

He deserves someone who can make him feel loved and safe, who can take him in his arms and make him feel like he’s home. No matter how much Wonwoo loved him, he probably wasn’t the person who could do that for him. He wasn’t able to prove Mingyu how much he loves him, so he’s in no place to stop him from leaving. 

 

The moment Mingyu walked away, though, Wonwoo felt like he lost the last level of a game, the most important one, the one who could lead to the “happy” ending. It was as if the words “Game over” faded in right before his eyes while watching the other’s retreating back. 

 

He had fucked up. 

 

If it was a game, Wonwoo could’ve loaded the level, going through this part once again and change things, choosing the option that could’ve made Mingyu stay by his side. This way, none of them would be suffering because of the other. 

However, there’s no restart button in life and so he has just to deal with this real world and bear the pain of this separation, hoping that, one day, the pain will fade away and leave behind the happy memories. 

 

As time passed, though, Wonwoo couldn’t stop thinking that it would’ve been better if all of that was just a game. That way, he could’ve replayed the level over and over again until he would win. 

Living like this, living without Mingyu hurt too much. 

He couldn’t handle the void in his heart which would suddenly skip some beats or tightening when his mind would wander and end up reminiscing things he would’ve preferred to lock in the furthest closet of his mind, at least until it wouldn’t hurt this much. 

 

The taller’s soft features. 

 

The shyness and flushed cheeks when they first met. 

 

Mingyu’s bright smile which showed his pearly teeth and his two puppy-like fangs. 

 

Wonwoo getting closer to the taller and finding out he liked the boy for real. 

 

Mingyu’s confession under the cherry blossom tree next to the library Wonwoo used to go to study for his finals, light pink petals falling around them almost making them feel like they were in another world, their own little world.  

 

The cute dates and hot nights they spent together, inebriated by the other’s presence, warmth and scent. 

 

Wonwoo’s cheeks burning when Mingyu would take his hand and entangle their fingers in front of their friends and other people, not caring about who was watching them and the kind of looks they would get. 

 

Wonwoo misses all of this and has only himself to blame. 

It was his fault if the love of his life had walked away from him, if he was now laying in the dark of his bedroom thinking of all the precious memories he had made with Mingyu. 

It’s only his fault if he had a brake in his head whickìh stopped him from saying the right words to make Mingyu stay, if he had a brake in his steps which made him unable to run after Mingyu and keep him from leaving. 

As he mulls over, Wonwoo realises it wasn’t the first time he felt braked. 

He had always been like that. Mingyu was the one who had a lot to give without asking for anything in return. Wonwoo didn’t give as much as he wanted to, giving the minimum thinking it was enough to reassure the other about his feelings. 

Wonwoo doesn’t want to find a justification for his behaviour but he had never been too good with people and most of all with feeling, in particular, his feelings. 

However, he swears he wanted to do well. 

Wonwoo wanted to do his best to make Mingyu happy. He just wanted to make him smile like how the other had done with him countless times. 

 

So now, still blankly staring at the “game over” screen, Wonwoo becomes aware of how his heart had gone numb over the time, unable to feel nothing but that emptiness left two years ago. 

Mingyu took away with him a big part of Wonwoo, leaving him with a heart which wouldn’t flutter, wouldn’t beat nor wouldn’t ache. 

 

That night, he cries next to his window, looking for an answer in the black desert standing up above. Wonwoo finds himself asking at the moon, at the stars and at the night sky to give him a remedy to make his heart beat again. He doesn’t know what else to do other than asking them, asking the gods populating the heavens to send him someone who could save him from this nothing he feels. He knows that who the someone he’s asking for is, so he shamelessly asks for another chance with Mingyu. He was the one who ruined things but he’s now promising the brightest star in the sky that he wouldn’t waste this occasion, that he wouldn’t fuck up and end up losing Mingyu once again. 

 

While looking up at the dark ocean above his head, however, he feels like a part of him wants to give up on love as well as life. Lately, Wonwoo had been asking himself if it was really worth going on when you feel nothing at all; when you’re just an empty shell pretending to protect a precious pearl inside of you; when you’re changing different masks based on the emotions you should feel when, in reality, you don’t feel any of them; when you’re a blank document paper opened on the desktop of a writer who’s in a slumber: you’re waiting for something to come, to fill you but it never does and you stay there, empty. 

 

Wouldn’t it be easier to turn everything off like you do when you don’t want to play anymore? Shutting off the console and leaving everything behind? 

 

These dark thoughts haunt Wonwoo since the third month after the break-up. He tells himself that this darkness can’t control him because he’s getting good at dealing with the game that life is. He’s good at escaping but the shadow chasing him is getting bigger. The growing fear of being caught and be trapped only nourish the shadow. 

Day by day, Wonwoo gets more hopeless, his sole remedy being too far away from him. 

He’s sure that being again with Mingyu would help him healing, becoming once again the person he was before, maybe even a better version of that one. 

It’s impossible, though, with the other boy being nothing but a distant dream as of now. 

Day by day, Wonwoo feels himself decelerating, growing tired of running away from the shadow, thinking that maybe it is better if the latter grabs him and cages him behind its bars made of sadness and pain. 

 

Wonwoo falls asleep that night, feeling exhausted by all the thinking and crying. He dreams of Mingyu, of holding that hand again; of being again the cause of the other boy’s smile; of teasing him so he could get to hear that cute whine of his; of kissing and feeling those soft but chapped lips on his, the taste of the red wine, which he used to drink with his best friend Minghao, lingering on them and helping him getting drunk in those sweet kisses. 

 

He wakes up the morning after, feeling an uncomfortable weight on his chest which is too familiar to him as he’s grown used to it. 

He feels like crashing again, but, today, it’s in a different way. He’s crashing but he can hear again the voice in his head which used to tell him to keep running, to find the light which could guide him out of that darkness. 

Wonwoo can’t help but wonder that, maybe, seeing Mingyu in his dreams was the kind of remedy he was asking for, the wake-up call to actually do something other than crying over their memories. 

 

Wonwoo thinks he may be a fool but he wants to run again and see if he can reach Mingyu, grab him and take him back to him. 

He hopes it’s not too late to do that, that he didn’t go too far in these two years. 

Their friends used to say they were soulmates, that kind of people that no matter how further away from the other they would’ve been, they were bound to overcome that distance and find the other again. 

Mingyu used to believe them and Wonwoo would tease him that there’s nothing like soulmates in the real world, it’s something that only exists in books and movies. 

Funny how he’s now the one who wants to believe in their words, the idea of Mingyu really being his soulmate making him concentrate on reaching the younger no matter what, even if it meant falling and stumbling along the way. 

Wonwoo knows it’s not something easy to do but he’s determined. He will do whatever it takes to be by Mingyu’s side again.

 

He glances at his computer screen from the bed, the “game over” screen still there, right before his eyes. 

 

‘Game over. Give up?’

 

_ “No, never. I won’t give up.” _

**Author's Note:**

> It's my first time writing about a couple that's not Soonhoon and I was a bit nervous, not really knowing if I could do a good job. However, the song reminded me of them and I felt like I should've let everything I was feeling at that moment go. So here we are!  
> If you got to the end, thank you for reading it! Leave kudos and comments to let me know what you think of it!  
> I hope you liked it and I think by the end of this week I'll update the [**Still Lonely**](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16802155/chapters/39437422) Soonhoon au!!


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